I recently wrote a short PDF describing one method of bootstrapping yourself into a game store with a modest budget. In the book I discuss the techniques without pitching the benefits of this method beyond a couple of bullet points. How do you make selling out of a flea market an advantage instead of a liability?

Less Cash

Your biggest expense is still inventory, but you need far less because you have less space to display it. Whereas the full-blown brick & mortar store might require $15,000 to $25,000 in inventory, you can start the flea market with $1,500 to $5,000 in goods.

You won't bother with employees for a store that's only open two days per week. So you have no payroll costs (which means none of the associated costs of payroll).

You spend less on fixtures. Even if you dress your space up (I've seen some surprisingly attractive flea market spaces), you'll spend less than you would elsewhere because you have less to spend it on. You're not likely to buy any gondolas. You'll need only a few wall fixtures and some sort of freestanding displays.

You have no rent deposit. A rent deposit is often your first and last month's rent. Can you find a better use for $4,000 or $6,000? I could.

No CAM, and no CAM overages. No repair bills. You won't replace ceiling fixtures or broken glass.

No Commitment

With a commercial lease, you might indebt yourself to a lease between $12,000 and $200,000. At a flea market, you pay month-to-month. If things go poorly, you won't lose your house. You also maintain your credit rating.

You could run the business seasonally. If you hate working outdoors in the heat, work during the cooler months.

You can also skip a week here and there. If you think going to a busy game convention would be better than your regular sales at the flea market, most flea markets allow you to miss a weekend from time to time. Ask about these policies when you're looking at local options.

Customers

You won't bother with a flea market that gets fewer than 1,000 shoppers per day. Busy markets, or medium markets that sponsor special events, can number tens of thousands per day.

I firmly believe (and will do an article on this soon) that your business needs to focus on a sales-building strategy that involves making new customers. Most game retailers think primarily about recovering lost customers—which is perfectly valid. For a short while. After that, you must make new customers to replace the ones you naturally lose to attrition.

This guaranteed foot traffic is an excellent source of potential new customers. If you build your business with new customer acquisition in mind, the flea market might be better for building your community than a traditional shopping center. You might even keep the location open after you get a “real” space as a feeder location.

Rent's a Joke

Vendor spaces locally run $200 to $300 per space. Yes, it's less space, but it's also much less expensive than an outdoor shopping center. You should be able to pay that rent with only $400 to $600 a month in sales, or $100 to $150 per weekend.

Focus on Your Strengths

With a 10' x 20' vendor space, you can fit 2 game tables. That's up to a dozen people you can include in card tournaments, demo games, and other activities. Run a D&D miniatures league.

Sell only your highest-turning, small-footprint items. In most cases, that means CCGs. Start with Magic. Sell boosters and boxes, but focus on singles. Pick 2-3 more CCGs, preferably games that you play.

Extended Hours

Some flea markets are open 7 days a week. Yes, traffic during the weekdays is considerably less, but having that option gives you the ability to plan midweek events, especially during the summer when kids are out of school. While game store activity focuses on after-work hours, sales don't necessarily follow the same pattern. I used to consider 5:00 PM my “half-way” point at my store. That is, I looked at my sales at 5 and doubled them. That's what I expected to do by the end of the night. So after work the store might have a much higher body count, but the sales per hour wasn't necessarily much higher.

Short version: don't write off those daytime hours. You can see extensive sales during that time.

If that's not an option for you because of another job, don't worry about it. Work on the weekends and be home in time for dinner.

Credibility

Working out of a flea market lends you a bit more credibility than working out of your home. Despite the bargaining mentality of the flea market shoppers, you can still sell singles for higher prices than the hugely competitive atmosphere online. If you sell the same items in the flea market that you would have sold online, you'll earn more off of each sale and save yourself any auction fees, shipping costs, and Paypal fees. You'll increase your income by 10% from the fees and probably 15-30% from the credibility advantage.

Building a Community

Building relationships with customers, demo people, vendors, and others in the industry is critical to your success. Start mailing lists. Create and distribute a newsletter. Make your Facebook page and get “likes” during this stage.

If you establish these relationships before you're ready to launch your “real” store, you'll start your store off with a much better chance of success. You might also be able to capitalize on this network with a crowdfunding effort to finance your growth to the next stage.

A Flea Market, Really?

A real-life success story prompted this whole topic. A local company worked out of a flea market for a couple of years, worked its way up to three spaces, and then moved into a nearby shopping center. They didn't move into a very large space, but they are still growing. They turned a personal collection and a bit of cash into a business capable of supporting a couple of people.

That's Why. What About How?

Go spend $5 on The Flea Market Way. If you don't have the the bucks for a flea market store in your bank account right now, don't worry. Flea markets are the topic of Phase II of this plan; Phase I describes the stages leading up to financing this stage, and you can start that with $100. You have that, right?

One Last Thing

One of the first people to buy this book sent me a note thanking me for it. He had looked at opening a game store a few months ago, and this column talked him out of it. Now, he has taken the advice in this book and his initial sales are about double the projections I use for the book. His goal of opening a game store, which he had written off as impossible because he didn't have the finances, could be happening in less than two years.